WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court said Monday it will consider shutting down a multibillion-dollar class action investors' lawsuit against Facebook parent Meta stemming from the privacy scandal involving the Cambridge Analytica political consulting firm.
The justices agreed to hear Meta's appeal of a lower-court ruling that allowed the class action to go forward. Investors allege that Meta did not fully disclose the risks that Facebook users' personal information would be misused by Cambridge Analytica, a firm that supported Donald Trump’s successful Republican presidential campaign in 2016.
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Inadequacy of the disclosures led to two significant price drops in the price of the company's shares in 2018, after the public learned about the extent of the privacy scandal, the investors say.
The case will be argued in the fall.
Meta already has paid a $5.1 billion fine and reached a $725 million privacy settlement with users.
Cambridge Analytica had ties to Trump political strategist Stephen Bannon. It had paid a Facebook app developer for access to the personal information of about 87 million Facebook users. That data was then used to target U.S. voters during the 2016 campaign.